PLAE is the
largest and longest established conservation project in Mali. The
project was set up under the Malian Textile Development Company
in 1986 to combat the increasing problem of erosion on fields and
village land. Cotton sales had increased farmers' incomes and
surplus cash was used to buy more cattle. Overgrazing then caused
decreased vegetative cover and therefore more runoff. An increase
in erosion followed, and this finally led to poorer crop yields.
PLAE introduced the concept of "village land-use
management", planned and coordinated by village
associations. Several erosion control techniques have been
introduced - some more successfully than others. For example,
live fences and tree planting on an individual basis have been
very popular, whereas grazing control has been very difficult to
put into practice.

Unlike most
of Mali, the area where PLAE operates is not arid. There is
usually enough rainfall for food crops - and also for growing
cotton.

But just
like elsewhere in the Sahel, there has been a reduction in
rainfall over the last twenty years. The annual average in the
Koutiala area has fallen from 1020 mm (19311971) to 820 mm
(1972-1987).

Farmers now
have two main problems. With the lower rainfall, short drought
spells during the growing season have become more common. But of
more concern is the violence of the rain when it does fall.
During the months of July and August there is often just too much
rainfall - and it is concentrated into intense showers.

The result
is runoff and erosion. A single rainstorm is enough to cause
severe erosion if the land is not adequately protected by a good
cover of grass or crops.

The land in
the area has become degraded by water and wind erosion and the
problem has got much worse in recent years. Several factors have
helped to accelerate the rate of degradation:

1. The human
population has increased in recent years - by more than 40%
between 1976 and 1987.

2.
There is a growing shortage of good agricultural land. The
amount of land farmed has increased enormously, partly
because of the needs of the growing population, and partly as
a result of the popularity of the cash crop - cotton. There
is rarely a chance now to rest fields under the traditional
fallow system. The soil becomes exhausted and erodes more
easily.

More people
need more wood for cooking... and as a result the demand for
fuelwood has slipped out of balance with the supply. Only 60
years ago this area used to be a forest. Now it only produces
about half of the wood that is required. Villagers have even
started to cut the protected fruit and nut trees "Nere"
(Parkia biglobosa) and "Karite" (Butyrospermum
parkii) which grow within the fields.

Poor
husbandry practices, like burning crop residues and ploughing
downslope, have helped to make the erosion problem worse.

One unusual
factor in the land management problem here is the success of the
cotton production in the area, which has indirectly led to
erosion. What has happened is as follows:

Cotton
production is promoted by CMDT and the families who plant cotton
can make a good income from it which is very often invested in
livestock. According to PLAE there are now many more livestock in
the area than the land can support. The result is severe
overgrazing, leading to increased runoff from the plateaux. The
runoff has in turn caused erosion on the agricultural fields,
and/the yield of the cotton crop has decreased.

 a
large, and growing population a
greatly expanded farmed area under the cash crop,
cotton a
shortage now of good land heavy,
intense rainfall in certain months a
fuelwood shortage leading to deforestation
overstocking of cattle and consequent overgrazing poor
traditional cultivation practices making erosion
worse
decreasing crop yields due to reduced soil fertility.

The erosion
in the cotton fields and the expressed concern of the villagers
themselves convinced CMDT that action needed to be taken.

Some
recommendations for better resource management had been developed
by a research project [the Division of Research on Rural
Production Systems (DRSPR)], which had been working on erosion
control for a number of years. These were used as the basis of a
programme, and PLAE - the "project which struggles against
erosion" was born.

PLAE's
Approach and Objectives

PLAE began
operations in May, 1986. The twin objectives were:

 to halt land
degradation to improve
conditions for crop production

DRSPR had
formulated the concept of village land-use management using a
"global approach" to conservation. It had been
concluded that bits and pieces of isolated activity such as earth
bunding, for example, would not answer the overall problem.

The
recommendation was to introduce a programme of conservation
measures designed to protect the whole watershed from the
plateaux at the top to the valleys at the bottom. The programme
would be introduced in phases, starting with communal work at the
top of the watershed and ending with conservation on the actual
fields. This was the approach which PLAE adopted.

After
studying the profile of a typical watershed (see technical
section) the village land was divided into three zones, each
requiring different management systems. These were called:

The main
function of PLAE is to provide training for the staff of CMDT and
the villagers.

Once the
process of motivation and training is well underway in the
villages, the Village Associations take responsibility for
coordinating the programme and putting the various techniques
into practice.

During its
first three year phase, PLAE has helped more than 20 villages,
but has concentrated on the typical cotton-growing village of
Kaniko. Here the full range of conservation techniques has been
tested. Some of the techniques, like stone bunds. have a direct
effect on conservation, while others have an indirect effect -
for example improved cooking stoves.

Some of the
measures could be used in the drier areas of sub-Saharan Africa,
for example improved cattle pens. Others are particularly suited
to the climatic and economic conditions of this part of southern
Mali, for example tied ridging.

The
measures are as follows:

Protection
of the Plateaux

Grazing
control on the plateaux is essential to give the vegetation a
chance to recover. However this requires communal agreement, and
has so far met with little success - partly because the law
allows anyone to graze livestock on the common land, and anyone
can cut wood if a fee is paid to the government.

Earth
Bunds/Waterways

The
original plan was to build earth bunds to lead runoff from the
plateaux into waterways between fields. But in practice bunds
broke and the waterways led to gullying. The technique was soon
replaced in most places by...

Stone
Bunds

Stone bunds
sited just above the fields slow and filter the runoff. There is
no need then for a waterway, and this has proved a better way of
protecting fields. Stones are transported by the farmers' donkey
carts which have proved cheaper than transport by lorries and
just as efficient. Work is carried out by village groups.

Live fences
around farmers' fields only give a limited amount of protection
against erosion mainly by filtering out sediment from runoff.
Their main purpose is keeping out livestock and they are popular!

Grass
Strips

Broad
strips of grass across the slope in farmers' fields act as living
barriers to runoff. These have been reduced in size and spaced
further apart since the original design because farmers felt they
took up too much space. Lack of suitable grass seed has been
another problem.

Check
Dams

Gullies in
fields are stabilised by small check dams of stone or branches.
When built carefully, these can be make a difference very
quickly.

Tree
Planting

Communal
tree planting in the form of village woodlots has not been as
popular or as easy to organise as tree planting by individuals.
The project has now changed its emphasis towards planting at the
farm or household level by individuals.

Cultivation
Practices/Tied Ridging

Conservation
farming techniques have not been fully adopted. However most
farmers now plough across the slope as recommended. A special
ox-drawn implement which makes tied ridges is being introduced.
But most farmers still have to make earth ties in the furrows by
hand - which is time consuming and therefore not very popular.

The
traditional cattle pens have been increased in size. Stems and
leaves from crops are thrown in to be trampled and mixed with
manure to form a rich and bulky compost. This is spread on the
fields and helps to maintain fertility.

Improved
Stoves

Improved
low cost cooking stoves are 30% more efficient in terms of
fuelwood usage than conventional stoves. Stoves are made locally
from earth, and save women some of the time and labour involved
in collecting firewood. This programme began in 1987, and up to
1989 more than 6,000 stoves have been made.

PROJECT
MANAGEMENT AND ORGANISATION OF WORK

Management
of the Project:

PLAE has
its headquarters at Koutiala, where a small team of specialist
trainers are based. These trainers run technical courses for
CMDT's extension staff. The village associations are motivated
and trained in better conservation methods by PLAE and by the
CMDT staff. However, since 1983 the number of extension staff has
been reduced in this area and because they have several other
duties related to cotton growing, it is not always easy for them
to give enough time to PLAE activities.

Organisation
of Conservation Work:

CMDT is
handing over increasing responsibility to the village
associations for the management of cotton production and general
development. Village associations were set up by CMDT several
years ago to assist with activities such as cotton marketing. In
Kaniko, the village where PLAE concentrated its early
interventions, the village association was set up in 1979.

Village
associations are responsible for conservation of all land within
each village and it is PLAE's hope is that they will eventually
accept full responsibility for the management and development of
their own territory. Within each village association, there is a
development committee which controls technical teams, each of
which is responsible for a particular task. For example, one team
is responsible for surveying and lays out contours with a water
tube level. Technical teams also direct group work and record
achievements.

The village
association helps organise working groups: it has been found
that, for communal work, large groups are very difficult to
organise on a regular basis. Small groups of people who know each
other work better than large units!

PLAE does
not, at present, use incentives to encourage conservation work.
They are considered to be unnecessary because the people in this
region are relatively well-off. Also, people are given credit for
farm inputs under CMDT, the amount owed being deducted from
payments for cotton.

Participation:

Because the
village associations are the focus for conservation activities,
local participation in planning and implementation has been
assured. PLAE's objective is to help the associations to take
control of their own development. However experience shows that
it will take a number of years to achieve this fully,
particularly with the more complicated issues such as grazing
management.

Extension
and Training:

PLAE sees
itself as a training programme. Specific technical training is
given to CMDT extension staff during intensive in-service
training courses. Villagers are motivated and trained in better
conservation methods by means of the "GRAAP" method.
This is an interactive system of training based on the use of
"flannelgraphs", where cut out pieces of cloth are
stuck on a felt screen. Stories can be built up on the screen by
the villagers - the process of erosion, for example, can be
illustrated.

This
process is combined with a tour of village land by a delegation
of extension agents in the company of the villagers. This has
proved to be a very effective system in teaching the villagers
about land use planning.

Slide shows
are also used. There are two sequences of slides - one for staff
training, and one for the villagers. The sequences show the whole
cycle of erosion and degradation, followed by the planning
process and then conservation measures put into practice.

Written
material for training villagers is in the local language,
Bambara. Demonstration and experimental plots are also used for
extension.

YIELDS
AND BENEFITS

There are
no precise figures yet for the benefits of the different
conservation measures in terms of yield improvements.

However, it
is estimated that cotton yields can be raised from the current
average of about 1,300 kg/ha to 2,000 kg/ha if a programme of
conservation measures is adopted. Likewise, sorghum and millet
yields would probably rise from the current 800-900 kg/ha to
1,000 kg/ha or above.

The best
accepted of the measures have been ones which can be carried out
on an individual basis. Examples are the live fences around
private fields and tree planting near the homestead. Several
techniques - especially those which require communal action -
have not gone further than the pilot phase. It is proving much
more difficult to organise group work on communal land than
individual work on private land.

Workload

There is
already a heavy work load on the villagers for whom cotton is a
six-month activity. There is a need to develop and emphasise less
labour intensive techniques.

Village
Land Use Management

Physical
conservation measures are the framework for the programme. But
until there is a change in attitude by the villagers to the use
of fuelwood and grazing land there will still be a major
challenge for the project. However a change in attitude is
difficult to foresee with the present laws on the use of communal
land.

Women's
Role

Women still
only occupy a background role in the village associations. For
example, only two out of 17 members in Kaniko's Development
Committee are women. Women need to be brought more into the
process of decision making.

Monitoring
and Evaluation

PLAE does
not yet have as much information as it would like to be able to
measure the effect of each conservation technique. This is
essential to be able to show which techniques work best!

LESSONS
AND CONCLUSIONS

1. Land
degradation is not only a problem in the drier, poorer areas of
the Sahel! Even in this relatively prosperous zone where there is
a profitable cash crop, there are serious problems of
overgrazing, fuelwood supply and erosion.

2. The
technical answers to conservation in a relatively wet area may be
different from the drier zones, but the basic approach by a
conservation project should be similar.

3. Village
land-use management is a new idea in Mali. Village land-use
management looks for solutions for each of the land use
categories - and the village as a whole is responsible for
putting them into practice. PLAE's experience will be of interest
for all of Mali.

4. The
project may have been overoptimistic. Several of the technical
research recommendations have not proved workable in the reality
of village life.

5.
Flexibility is very important! PLAE has been prepared to alter
techniques where necessary. For example earth bunds with
waterways, which was an unpopular and unsound technique has been
replaced by a much more appropriate system of stone bunding.

6. A change
of attitude by villagers towards more responsibility for the
environment may take years to achieve especially with the current
legislation on use of common land. Strong local institutions like
the village associations supported by PLAE are needed to take the
lead in communal resource management.

7. The
measures which have been adopted most quickly are those which are
cheap, do not take up productive land, and are implemented on an
individual basis. Groups can work here- but only small informal
groups of family and friends!

8.
Mechanised transport of stone is not always more efficient than
donkey carts - as PLAE's experience has shown.

9. The
"GRAAP" system of motivation and training combined with
the slide sequences have proved very effective.

10.
Remaining problems include the need to improve monitoring and to
increase the representation of women in decision making.

"In the
places which had no vegetation cover there has been a
regeneration since we started the various
conservation measures, and in the parts of the fields
where there were gullies, the gullies have been
healed by the farmers' action after one or two years.
There are many measures adopted here which you can
really say have improved matters."